


The Kid

by AParisianShakespearean



Series: Immortal Longings [2]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Hank's POV, Post Game fic, Rated T for language, post good ending where everyone lives, reflections
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-14 17:50:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15394146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AParisianShakespearean/pseuds/AParisianShakespearean
Summary: After the debacle at the CyberLife tower, Hank thinks about Connor while he waits for him.





	The Kid

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ladymdc](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladymdc/gifts).



> A/N this fic can be paired alongside my longfic "Our Immortal Longings" that focuses on Connor's life post android revolution, and the relationship he develops with an actress and bookshop worker :)

Hank missed the kid.

Early on he hated admitting the kid wasn’t so bad. He started to hate it less as time went on, but he wasn’t sure if it was because he was drunk. Vaguely he recalled pointing a gun at his head in the park. He shouldn’t have done that— he really needed to apologize.

Then a day or two passed after. That was when he refused to kill the girl at Kamski’s place. Things really started to change when they left Kamski’s. They had been changing, yes, probably since he pulled him from the roof, but Kamski’s was the moment it clicked into place. That was the moment Hank knew Connor had empathy.

He had empathy, and he cared. About his people, about Hank. He wasn’t just a machine, and when Hank left the CyberLife tower, he told Connor he was happy for him. He should have also told him how proud he was. He may have saw him on TV—hell that was all the news stations were running, but he didn’t see Connor after that. He hated that he didn’t get to say everything he wanted to say that last time. He hated that he may never see Connor again, and Connor would never know how proud he was.

Until he got the email that morning, the email that said: _Lieutenant, do you think we could meet?_

In the snow, Hank waited for Connor outside the food truck. He wondered what Connor wanted to tell him. He wondered if he was even going to tell Connor what he regretted not telling him before. He didn’t even know what the kid was to him. His friend, maybe? That seemed too much yet not really enough. And hell. He may have been flat out wasted when he had that other thought, but once he may have thought that Connor looked a little bit like Cole.

About a month ago when Connor first waltzed into the police station, he was the one waiting for Hank. Now there Hank was, waiting for Connor. He was about ready to get into the car, it was too fucking cold. About ready, before he heard the footsteps, light and brisk against the snow. He didn’t even have to look to know it was Connor.

It had been two weeks since the eleventh, two weeks since the revolution. The first time Hank saw Connor at Jimmy’s Bar, he may as well have been staring at a blank canvas. He saw Connor in the snow then, smiling, and looking fresh and new, and he saw a blank canvas again. But last time, there had been no potential. Connor couldn’t be anything else but what he was designed to be. Yet Hank looked at Connor then and he saw his potential. He saw the paths he could take, what all he would do. He knew he would be proud of him either way.

They walked toward each other. Hank clapped his hand on Connor’s back. That was all he meant to do at first, just give the kid that one gesture of solidarity, let him know that he supported him and his decisions. But something happened when he looked at the kid’s goofy face. It was a face that maybe looked too much like how Cole’s face would have looked, and a face that used to be blank and emotionless, studying the room and the surroundings. Hank started to see an awareness the longer he knew Connor, a want, and a sense of empathy. He started to see that Connor could be more.

There Connor was in the snow. He was more. He was more and how much more he could be as he learned and lived every day. He may have been more proud about that than anything else.

Hank embraced him. He embraced him because it was his impulse. But he was proud, happy, and he really, really did miss him a lot.

At first Connor’s arms flapped awkwardly at his sides, but like he learned how to put himself in another’s shoes, like he did at Kamski’s place, he learned when someone put their arms around him, they were looking for an embrace and it was best to embrace them back.

“I’m proud of you son,” he said when he pulled away. He said what he should have said that night at CyberLife. And Connor grinned, and maybe Connor knew what that meant, when he called him that. Maybe Hank did too.

Hank clapped him on the back again. “Hey,” he said. “Can we get in the car? I’m freezing my ass off out here.”

About five minutes later, heat on and music off, silence fell between them. Not the awkward silence in their car rides before, when Connor was just the android he had to deal with, but a silence of comradery and shared experience. But Hank knew Connor well enough to know there was something there, something he was thinking.

Hank was right. Connor, staring straight ahead, said, “I should have known sooner. I should have done something sooner.”

The words were heavy in the air. Heavy, but Hank was proud. All over again, Hank was proud of Connor.

He learned what regret was.

“You did something when it mattered,” Hank said.

“I should have known sooner.”

“You figured it out,” he told him. “A lot of people spend their whole lives and don’t figure it out. You did.”

“You really are proud of me Hank?”

Hank knew what Connor wanted. He wanted to be absolved of his guilt, wanted to live and forget his mistakes. Hank couldn’t give him any of that. Whatever forgiveness in himself Connor needed— that could only come from living every day. Yet there was something he could do.

“I don’t lie,” Hank reassured. “I wouldn’t lie to you Connor.”

“You’re right. You wouldn’t.”

When Connor smiled again, Hank didn’t see Cole anymore. He only saw Connor.

“I know it’s hard,” Hank continued, “not to regret and not to see the things you could have done. But you can look ahead. Just a drunk cop’s opinion, but I think it’s a pretty good one.”

“It’s not as easy as we thought it would be,” Connor said, neither sadly or regretfully.

Hank never expected it to be. The hard part was always the after. “Living isn’t easy.”

“I think it’s worth it.”

Hank didn’t always think so, but he didn’t have enough courage just to end it all. But he was starting to see that there were a few things that he might wanted to stick around to see. Markus and the other androids—there was a lot of work to be done there, and Connor could help a lot with that. There were a few things Hank could help with too.

“Sumo misses you, by the way,” he thought to tell Connor. “You should come see him sometime.”

“You don’t mind?”

“Hey,” he said, surprised at Connor’s surprise. “You know if ever you need a place, you have one with me.”

Connor’s brows furrowed. “Hank, I don’t want to assume…”

“Shut up son.”

By the smug grin on that goofy face, Hank figured Connor was learning what sarcasm was. Hank was proud of his boy again.

“Whatever you say Lieutenant.”

Hank swore he heard Connor laugh. He liked the sound of it. He liked the sound of it in the car, and he liked it when he took Connor home later and Sumo jumped in his arms and licked him.


End file.
